June 28, 2011

June 27, 2011

Skateboarding's conventional wisdom says that in 1996, young skaters everywhere found themselves at a crossroads, because of the release of two (or three) videos: Welcome to Hell and Trilogy (Mouse, of course, was a huge factor too, but for post purposes it can be seen in the same light as Trilogy).

Essentially, the thinking says that depending on what video this youngster bought/saw/bootlegged first, would determine their skateboarding future, i.e. Misfits T's, backside 50-50's and a life-long devotion to Jamie Thomas. The other path would lead to shell toes or Axions (later), switch K grinds and a proclivity to start Menace inspired websites a decade down the line.

This macro view of things is fine, but it doesn't really go much further than what's laid out previously. It's simplistic. I fall, more or less, into the latter mold/category of dude, having had shell toes and a Front windbreaker that got plenty of action in those late-90's, though it must be said that I've got more than a passing appreciation for the Misfit's discography and Welcome to Hell is definitely a top fiver.

Making these broad sweeping categorizations regarding the impact of videos that are a decade and a half old really only leads to caveats and asterisks to any point one tries to make boldly.

Instead, I'll get more done relaying the little ways that Trilogy influenced me, 15 years on.

-Skating Pier 7 was an important and attainable goal. Between the McBride brothers part and all the other clips, it was a must. Therefore, in 1998, when I finally made it (at night for 15 minutes with my family looking on), a crooked grind on one of the Bay Blocks while it still had coping is something I'm still talking about 13 years later. Still wishing I could have gotten my parents to somehow drive me do Lockwood (never made a family trip to LA though).

-For years I believed that Gino Ianucci wore a desert camo t-shirt during his first line, and I took it upon myself to find one. Only upon viewing the DVD box set of World videos in the mid-aughts did I realize that due to a blown out Hi-8 transfer, he was not wearing desert camo; that's standard camo. Oh well.

-Kareem Campbell does the best nollie hardflip that will ever be done. Ever. On flat.

-Trilogy gave bragging rights to my roommate who played cee-lo with Maurice Key at the trade show.

-Even at the time, I knew Sam Devlin really had no place in the video.

Edit:-I forgot. Trilogy also gave my skate crew the term "Shilohing," named for of course, Shiloh Greathouse, who crouches once, thinks better of the crouch, then lands a varial heelflip. 99% of the time when one crouches, stands up, and then tries a trick again (without "cleansing," as in both feet off the board), they miss the trick. Try it. Are there any other instances of dudes doing this in a video and running the footage/making it?

June 22, 2011

Call me a curmudgeon. Seriously, I deserve it. Late in the early morning, following the always confounding "Go Skateboarding Day" spent at the shop, I'm in no real mood to, well, not appreciate good skateboarding, but I sure as shit don't want to see some teenager doing it. To paraphrase a since deleted screed, I don't have much faith in a decent portion of skateboarding's youth.

With that said, I, having no clue who Trevor Colden was, embarked on watching the video above, and immediately wrote the dude off for the following reasons: Young. Skinny. Perpetually wears a beanie in southern California. Well, I sure got my ass handed to me.

Colden, however old he really is (no more than 17?), while not doing lines on picinic (sic) tables and the such, is solid as fuck, has good footwork and just has that old backside 180 nosegrind big-long-round-rails type of shit going for him. Beyond the pushes fuertes that he exhibits throughout, what really sealed the deal were two tricks; the backside tailslide air-foot (the imbed starts there), which has been viewed five or six times in an effort to understand and the immensely angular backside 360, with zero slip-foot (his hat fell off!). Add to that the equally angular switch frontside heelflip, and oh, that 15 stair triple set stack and frankly, the dudes abide. We abide hard.

June 20, 2011

The Berrics gets "hacked" and shows back up on Monday with a slight design change, and a video player change that, while an improvement, still doesn't allow for embedding videos. In all, a lateral move at best.

June 17, 2011

June 16, 2011

Stumbled upon this evening: A 2005 NPR profile of Jeron Wilson, which is obviously pure gold. From the strange description of Girl's founding to the labored description of a switch backside heelflip, the story is everything you'd wanna hear from mid-decade NPR. Much of the story talks up the diversity angle; it'd be interesting to hear some follow up on that, if quantifiable stuff exists, because skateboarding's just about as diverse a thing you'll find, at least in city centers, and stuff.

June 15, 2011

I've got to admit, I've never really thought much about Anthony Schultz. Maybe It's because I didn't care, maybe it's 'cause I never met the guy, or maybe I was just sleeping. Whatever the case, his pro-debut part for Slave pysched me out. I mean fuck, over a full size fence? I've seen that handrail in a thousand-million-bazillion videos with every stupid figgy-feeble and I'd never even considered the possibility (un-possibility?) of going up and over. Rad.

June 14, 2011

June 13, 2011

Undisputed freestyle champion CJ Tambornino defended his title today against Nebraska flip-skipper Rob Warren. I thoroughly enjoyed myself, but it probably helped that I had two giant beers before 11Am. Side note: Super bummed dBong didn't make it to semi-finals. Star Trib was there, confused. I was equally confused by the large crowd of people doing yoga in the street.

Just in case you didn't know what you were doing on June 21st.

I was probably the only one who didn't watch the basketball game yesteday.

June 10, 2011

I went to NYC with the dudes above recently. It rained a lot, and as the video's description (on the actual page) suggests, we wasted most of the dry weather looking old (at least me) at the Bronx park. Once the locals showed up (i.e. 12-year-old street toughs on scooters) and the stink eyes began we bounced. Good times.

Also try to pick out the ball-fake during one of Gabe's clips. Amazing.

June 8, 2011

Three video related posts in a row! The above video is swassup, and after you view it, click right here and "like" the video. The dudes in it stand to win a bunch of money and a trip to Barcy if they win, so pass it forward, you know?

On a related note, I've still never seen CJ's ender or Jack's rail dance in real-time, it would be sick to put those out in non-slo-mo.

June 6, 2011

I finally got this on the interwebs. Thanks to Al for coming through with the DVD. It also coincides nicely with Sam McGuire's birthday. Featured above you can see Sam skating at a time when he regularly owned a skateboard. That switch ollie body varial to frontboard (the Lotti) is still HOT FIRE! to this day. Happy birthday man.

Speaking of hot fire, scorchin' ass days such as these remind me of the summer of 2001 when dudes were shooting the Transworld Minneapolis article that appeared later on, like spring 2002. It was this hot for a week. The mag had Bastien on the cover doing a kickflip backtail at Hollywood High. If anyone has a hard copy of that mag (I lost mine to basement flooding some years ago), or better yet, scans, use your ingenuity to get a hold of me. Any help is much appreciated.

June 2, 2011

Look at that fuckers! That's jerman Kahn (bold?) and jerboi Rubio (TRUST) just chilling the fuck out before they signed a contract to bring Ricky Rubio to the Minnesota Timberwolves for 2011-2012. Irrational exuberance aside, this is the best NBA news since whenever. Go Mavs.

Shaq retired. While trying to think of something witty to add, all I could wonder is if he was able to drink as many beers as Andre The Giant. By the way, if you Google Andre, the suggested search is "Andre The Giant drinking."